Date of Award

2017

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts

College

College of Arts and Sciences

Program

Communication, MA

First Advisor

Rachel Williams-Smith

Second Advisor

Peggie Ncube

Third Advisor

Jaspine Bilima

Abstract

Some things are never truly understood in life until you have the personal experience of living through them. This qualitative research was aimed at understanding the adult-lived experience after parental loss and how living through such an experience led those adults to change their perception about bereavement. The major question was “Why did the death of my mother communicate things to me that I never understood when I ministered to those who had lost their parents?” Experiencing the death of my mother was studied in relation to the lived experiences of three other Seventh-day Adventist adults from my university who had also lost their parents as adults (30-45 years of age).

Data was collected through one-on-one interviews, and open-ended research questions were used. Thematic analysis was used and nine themes emerged from the data. These were as follows: 1) needing church support, 2) valuing one-on-one communication with others, 3) needing God’s intervention, 4) believing that your parent would live many years, 5) feeling vulnerable and being overwhelmed, 6) needing to blame, 7) feeling guilty about not doing or saying something to the parent, 8) reviewing legacies, and 9) changing behavior. The results suggested that the death of a parent is very personal and difficult for adult children to accept. Whatever our relationship with our parents, it suggests that they portray an impression that life is predictive, worthy of living, trustworthy, and therefore, reasonable to endeavor.

The findings also suggest while mourning may gradually be resolved, the grief is never over because memories of the deceased parents keep returning to the bereaved children. This makes them feel either good or lost, depending on the relationship they had with their deceased parent. Finally, the results suggest that the intervention they get from their Seventh-day Adventist church and from having one-on-one communication with others helps them to cope with their loss.

Subject Area

Bereavement in adolescence; Loss (Psychology)

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